St. Hilda’s Student Harbours Dreams of Transforming Jamaica’s Ports with Robotics

Dervette Mignott, a student of St. Hilda’s Diocesan High School in St. Ann, clearly recalls the first time she saw a robot six years ago, during devotion.

“It was beyond fascinating to see how a bunch of aluminum pieces was able to function and carry out tasks without direct human assistance. Words will never be enough to explain what that morning did to 13-year-old me,” she shares in an interview with JIS News.

Though fascinated, she was reserved and shied away from joining her school’s robotics club until 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The grade-13 student has been participating in the FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) Jamaica National Robotics Championship for the past four years and is the Captain and Programming Lead of her school’s robotics team, ‘The Lady Bots’.

This weekend, Dervette will be participating in the competition for the final time, at Jamaica College in St. Andrew.

She will be pursuing tertiary studies in the field of logistics and hopes to merge it with her love for robotics.

“The knowledge and experience that I’ve gained over these few years will undoubtedly assist me to help my country to modernise its ports and supply chain, with the aim of developing Jamaica as a premier logistics hub in the Western Hemisphere,” she tells JIS News.

“I can confidently say my enthusiasm, passion, love, drive and obsession with robotics remain the same. When I became a part of the St. Hilda’s FTC team, I knew absolutely nothing. I was a technical writer and I was so clumsy. I was not allowed to touch the robot for too long,” she says with a chuckle.

Since then, she has taken on the roles of engineer and programmer, which helped her to garner skills in problem solving and critical thinking.

Dervette has also learnt how to collaborate effectively with her teammates, troubleshoot under pressure and approach challenges with creativity, persistence and patience.

“Throughout my time I’ve also developed better motor skills and a sharper eye for detail, especially when working with all these components and tools that we used to build our robots. When I became an engineer in fifth form, I could barely screw a nut on to a bolt without it falling and that really had me questioning why am I here? What am I doing? But I stayed and I’ve learnt, and though I’m not perfect, I can confidently say that I’m way better than I was back then. More importantly, I’ve gained a level of confidence that I never imagined I’d have at this stage. Robotics has taught me to speak up, share my ideas and take the lead when necessary,” she explains.

Dervette reasons that robotics taught her the importance of time management.

Noting that she has quite a number of responsibilities at school, she has mastered how to share her time among them all, while prioritising the most important one – being a student, especially in the final weeks leading up to competition days.

“My competition years were nothing short of excitement, struggles and plot twists. I can’t recall a single year where everything was just normal. There were times when we had to improvise robot parts with some of the most random objects such as book covers, KFC cups, you name it,” she says.

She shares an unforgettable experience in 2023 when her team’s programme magically disappeared right before their very first match, which meant that their robot was basically useless.

Last year, the team almost sat the competition out as the parts they ordered did not arrive until three days before the competition.

“We still managed to put something together and showed up, because our coach Mrs. Walters, does not call us her resilient girls for no reason. There were times when my team and I had to pull all-nighters just to meet our deadline or to have a functioning robot at the competition, but these experiences have really helped to shape my tenacity, strengthened my teamwork skills and taught me the value of perseverance,” she shares.

She expresses gratitude to FTC Jamaica and the various sponsors of the competition for the opportunity to explore a field that has been empowering students like her to push boundaries and break barriers in fields where Jamaicans are often under-represented.